Open Studios gives inside look into the work of artists

(photo Jacqueline Ramseyer/Bay Area News Group/May 5, 2014)
Cupertino artist Rachel Greenberg will be selling her glass and tile mosaic pieces during Open Studios the weekend of May 10-11 at 542 S. Murphy Avenue in Sunnyvale and May 17-19 at 100 Alerche Drive in Los Gatos.

Janet Fullmer Bajorek is one of the almost 400 artists participating in the 28th annual Silicon Valley Open Studios, continuing through May 18.

"Open Studios is a good opportunity for neighbors and people in the community to know there are artists living among them and we're working right here in the neighborhood," says the Los Gatos sculptor.

"It's an opportunity for the public to meet artists and get artwork at bargain prices. We can sell artwork for half the price of what a gallery charges because they have to pay rent and staff."

Bajorek knows both sides of the business, as a professional artist for more than three decades and as a gallery owner. She first opened Iguana Galleries in South Salem, N.Y. in 1989, moving it to her new home in Los Gatos in 1991.

In 1995 she opened a branch in San Francisco but says, "I was spending all my time going up to the gallery and taking care of things. I wasn't able to do my art work."

Now she represents three other artists in addition to herself and opens her Iguana Galleries twice each year and by appointment.

Bajorek occasionally gets calls from people wondering if she's got a pet store, but she says she liked the name because "I think of an iguana as a sort of evolutionary creature that has been on the Earth a long time, and I feel art is also evolutionary."

Bajorek says she's been interested in art since childhood, but also believes creativity runs in her family. Her grandfather Rudolph Dien was a sculptor who worked at Hearst Castle in San Simeon under the direction of famed architect Julia Morgan and publisher William Randolph Hearst. He also worked for Hollywood studios.

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"I never met him, but I saw a lot of his work growing up and my mother talked about it a lot. I was interested," she says.

Ceramics has been Bajorek's favored medium and she is best known for her sculptures of human figures and buildings with, she says, "a social message or a comment about our culture."

"I have one man who looks like a successful businessman from the back with a briefcase and a trench coat, but when you walk around to the other side he's homeless with a can to collect money."

Sculptures of a mother holding her dead son wrapped in an American flag during the Gulf War, a tiny house surrounded by skyscrapers, Silicon Valley stereotypes and buildings with homeless people inside are all representations of what Bajorek admits are her "strong feelings."

In recent years Bajorek has added wood assemblages to her portfolio and started offering art of another kind.

"I like to make social commentary with my ceramic sculptures, where the wood assemblages are just big, fascinating geometric pieces," she says.

"Instead of having a message, they're more decorative."

Bajorek's late father and late brother were both pattern-makers who made wood models used to make metal castings for items that ranged from airplane parts crafted during WWII to metal tree grates.

The more interesting shapes were set aside. Bajorek says, "I couldn't bear to burn them."

Instead, she is recycling them into new art pieces.

She strips the wood of any finish, places pieces in an abstract fashion on a background plywood board with a hanging system on the back and then paints them.

The finished pieces, which may contain as many as 15 assembled patterns, are large, with some measuring up to 4 by 4 feet.

Bajorek says her wood assemblages work best in a modern home or office and pretty much need to stand alone.

"They are interesting and eye catching so you wouldn't group them with other paintings," she says.

Bajorek is looking forward to welcoming new visitors during Open Studios, as well as returning guests.

For those attending Open Studios for the first time, Bajorek says she hopes they feel welcome to stop by any of the locations marked with distinctive yellow and black signs.

"There's no obligation or expectation to buy; artists just love to share their work," she says, adding that the public "should feel very relaxed about coming."

Bajorek says there are some patrons who do come in search of art to buy, realizing they are likely to get a better price because they're dealing directly with the artist, but buyers are a small percentage of Open Studios attendees.

Bajorek's Iguana Galleries studio is at 120 Clover Way in Los Gatos and will be open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on May 17 and 18.

In addition to her own ceramic sculptures and wood assemblages, Bajorek is showing the work of three other artists — Hugo Lecaros, a Peruvian artist who works in watercolors and oils; Linda Fullmer, a watercolorist; and Stephanie Howarth, who does photography and art quilts.